Google Early Days with John Looney

John Looney spent more than 10 years at Google. He started with infrastructure, and was part of the team that migrated Google File System to Colossus, the successor to GFS. Imagine migrating every piece of data on Google from one distributed file system to another.

In this episode, John sheds light on the engineering culture that has made Google so successful. He has very entertaining stories about clusterops and site-reliability engineering.

Google’s success in engineering is due to extremely high standards, and a culture of intellectual honesty. With the volume of data and throughput that Google responds to, 1-in-a-million events are likely to occur. There isn’t room for sloppy practices.

John now works at Intercom, where he is adjusting to the modern world of Google infrastructure for everyone. This conversation made me feel quite grateful to be an engineer in a time where everything is so much cheaper, so much easier, and so much more performant than it was in the days when Google first built everything from scratch.

I had a great time talking to John, and hope he comes back on the show again in the future because it felt like we were just scratching the surface of his experience.

Software Engineering Daily is looking for sponsors for Q3. If your company has a product or service, or if you are hiring, Software Engineering Daily reaches 23,000 developers listening daily. Send me an email: jeff@softwareengineeringdaily.com

Sponsors

Deep learning promises to dramatically improve how our world works. To make deep learning easier and faster, we need new kinds of hardware and software–which is why Intel acquired Nervana Systems, a platform for deep learning. Intel Nervana is hiring engineers to help develop a full stack for AI, from chip design to software frameworks. Go to softwareengineeringdaily.com/intel to apply for a job at Intel Nervana. If you know don’t know much about the company, check out the interviews I have conducted with engineers from the company. You can find these at softwareengineeringdaily.com/intel.

The ConsenSys Academy Developer Program is a free, highly selective and carefully designed 10-week online curriculum where you will immerse yourself in blockchain development and earn a ConsenSys blockchain certification. By completing the program, you will be eligible for immediate hire by ConsenSys, a leader in the blockchain space, focused on the Ethereum platform. If you want to learn about blockchains, and become a developer for blockchain technology, check out the ConsenSys academy, by going to softwareengineeringdaily.com/blockchain. Applications are open from now until July 1 so you want to apply soon. To learn more about ConsenSys and Ethereum, please visit consensys.net, and sign up for the ConsenSys weekly newsletter for everything you need to know about the blockchain space.

Dice.com will help you accelerate your tech career. Whether you’re actively looking for a job or need insights to grow in your role, Dice has the resources you need. Dice’s mobile app is the fastest and easiest way to get ahead. Search thousands of jobs from top companies. Discover your market value based on your unique skill set. Manage your tech career and download the Dice Careers app on Android or iOS today. And to check out the Dice website and support Software Engineering Daily, go to dice.com/sedaily.

Codepath is an 8-week iOS and Android development class for professional engineers who are looking to build a new skill. Codepath has free evening classes for dedicated, experienced engineers and designers.hether you are an engineer who is looking to retrain as a mobile developer–or you are looking to hire mobile engineers, go to Codepath.com to learn more.